Failing a "health test" (having a hematocrite above 50%) gets you nothing else but a neat little slap of thw wrist and a 14 days "pause" for "health reasons".
My estimate is, that 95% of riders failing the "health check" are using either EPO or blood doping. 99,9% of the riders failing these test should ask for a refund from their doctors/soigneurs/quack for allowing the HCT to get above 50%
The extensive health surveillance offered by all major teams are not offered because the teams wants to catch the dopers - it's to make sure, that their star riders aren't caught.
How can employ someone for 8-10 years (as in Ullrichs case), soigneurs/DS'/assistents have probably spent more time with Der Jan than his wife(s). Lab work is done year round andthe amount of blood drawn for drug testing/health checks is probably only exceed by the amount of blood drawn/infused for performance enhancing purposes. People from the T-Mobile team now all of sudden remember, that there might have been a few suspicous looking types visiting Jan at his hotel rooms during the races.
For crying out loud - how on earth is it possible NOT to suspect and discover foul play. Needlemarks and the occassional haematoma from IV/SC injections/transfusions, how does that go unnoticed? Apperently, the only ones who actually got smarter after the Festina affair are the teams. They've gotten better at disposing the trash, which is much appreciated by hotel cleaning staff.
Also the doping is no longer traceable to the team, deniability in case of a positive drug test these days is a major issue, and the issue of doping is always (cleverly) presented as an isolated case limited to one individual rider - and not in any way related to the team. Well Phonak had HOW many isolated cases during the last couple of years????